Business

The turnaround in Cook Inlet oil and gas production in recent years is one of the big success stories for Alaska. It has come at a hefty expense, however, to the state treasury.
It turns out that inlet producers are being heavily subsidized by the state of Alaska, consultants to the state Legislatur...

JUNEAU — The Juneau Assembly has tripled a tax on cigarettes, with the intent that people will think twice before shelling out more than $10 for 20 smokes.
The Assembly on Monday night approved increasing the local tax to $3 a pack, up from the current $1. With an existing 5 percent sales tax and ...

Thurmond’s celebrated a grand opening in Anchor Point on Monday, the event signaling two big changes. First, the business is now owned by Dale and Elaine Griner. Second, its new name is Thurmond’s Far West Auto, a nod to Anchor Point’s claim as the most westerly highway point in North America....

The International Pacific Halibut Commission boosted halibut quotas across most of the state at their annual meeting last week, reversing the downward trend of the past several years.
The quota statewide for the commercial fishery is 18.47 million pounds, up from 16.75 million pounds in 2014.
The br...

KETCHIKAN— The Ketchikan Gateway Borough Assembly has postponed a vote on a proposed ban on commercial marijuana.
The Ketchikan Daily News reports assembly members on Monday voted to take a wait-and-see approach to commercial marijuana until April, after the close of the legislative session.
Recre...

JUNEAU — President Barack Obama has proposed $1 million in funding and a change in scope for the office of federal coordinator of Alaska natural gas projects.
But the proposal, for the budget year starting Oct. 1, doesn’t change plans for the office to close around the end of this month, federal...

If tickets could be sold to Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s hearings in March on the Interior Department’s annual appropriation, it would be a sell-out crowd as Secretary Sally Jewell is sure to come in for a roasting....

The fight over Kenai Loop natural gas appears to be over.
Attorneys for all four parties currently involved in the dispute — Cook Inlet Region Inc., the Alaska Mental Health Land Trust Authority, the Department of Natural Resources, and AIX Energy LLC — signed a joint request for dismissal Jan. ...

At its December meeting, South Peninsula Hospital Inc. Board of Directors welcomed Barbara Howard and Caroline Venuti as newly appointed members to the board.
Howard served on the Homer City Council from 2008-2014, was a member of the hospital board from 2007-2009 and was on the hospital’s elected...

South Peninsula Hospital and South Peninsula Behavioral Health welcome Donna Rollins, a board-certified family psychiatric nurse practitioner who specializes in children, adolescents and young adults. Rollins received her nurse practitioner degree at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn., and mo...

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